Donald Trump is going to start revising history to suit himself as soon as he takes office, former Rep. David Jolly (Fla.) predicted over the weekend.
“I think one of the things Donald Trump wants to do this term, starting on day one, is rewrite history,” Jolly, who served as a Republican in Congress but later renounced his affiliation with the GOP, told MSNBC’s Alex Witt. “We’re going to see it on COVID, having RFK Jr. there. We’re going to see it on Russia, having Tulsi Gabbard there. We’re going to see it with a lot of the prosecutions by having Kash Patel there, should these people get confirmed.”
Jolly was referring to Trump’s picks for health secretary, national intelligence director and FBI director respectively. Critics have sounded the alarm over Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s vaccine skepticism, Gabbard’s sympathetic views toward Russia, and Patel’s fondness for dangerous conspiracy theories and his fixation on Trump’s supposed enemies.
“I think we’re also going to see a retelling of January 6,” Jolly went on. “And the question is, does that start with his inauguration speech? Or is it something that happens by way of pardons? Or is it a prosecution — an attempted prosecution — of Liz Cheney?”
“I do think Donald Trump wants to rewrite history,” he concluded. “And to do that, he’s going to force upon the American people a narrative that largely is untrue, but that he hopes, with conservative media’s influence, he can win out with.”
Trump has vowed to pardon people convicted for participating in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, an attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Trump’s favor.
Even though the majority of those serving substantial prison time committed violent crimes, including assaulting law enforcement officers, the president-elect has referred to them as “peaceful January 6 protesters” and “hostages” who were unfairly prosecuted.
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He’s also made threatening comments about former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), warning that she “could be in a lot of trouble” for serving on the House panel that investigated the attack. He’s said that he believes members of the panel “should go to jail.”
Trump has a penchant for revisionist history, with a pattern of walking back promises, deflecting blame for his failures and dubiously taking credit for successes. He pledged during his 2024 campaign to reduce the prices of “everything,” but has already admitted since his victory that it’s “hard to bring things down once they’re up.”